NATURAL THEOLOGY. 61 



it a diversified, multifarious, or progressive opera- 

 tion, distinguishable into parts. The power in or- 

 ganized bodies, of producing bodies like them- 

 selves, is one of these principles. Give a philoso- 

 pher this, and he can get on. But he does not re- 

 flect what this mode of production, this principle 

 (if such he choose to call it) requires; how much 

 it presupposes ; what an apparatus of instruments, 

 some of which are strictly mechanical, is neces- 

 sary to its success ; what a train it includes of 

 operations and changes, one succeeding another, 

 one related to another, one ministering to another ; 

 all advancing, by intermediate, and, frequently, by 

 sensible steps, to their ultimate result ! Yet, be- 

 cause the whole of this complicated action is 

 wrapped up in a single term, generation, we are 

 to set it down as an elementary principle ; and to 

 suppose, that when we have resolved the things 

 which we see into this principle, we have suffi- 

 ciently accounted for their origin, without the ne- 

 cessity of a designing, intelligent Creator. The 

 truth is, generation is not a principle, but a pro- 

 cess. We might as well call the casting of metals 

 a principle ; we might, so far as appears to me, as 

 well call spinning and weaving principles : and 

 then, referring the texture of cloths, the fabric of 

 muslins and calicoes, the patterns of diapers and 

 damasks, to these, as principles, pretend to dis- 

 pense with intention, thought, and contrivance, on 

 the part of the artist ; or to dispense, indeed, with 

 the necessity of any artist at all, either in the ma- 

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